News

NOTE: If you had Dystopia installed prior to this update it's highly recommended you reinstall it ("delete local content" in steam, then re-download). You may have missing sound or other issues otherwise!

Hi all, after quite a few trials and tribulations we've finally released 1.4!

I'd like to give shout-outs to everyone who helped make this update happen. Hyphen-ated and other old contributors for some of the changes on this list - they're finally going live! Atomy for helping with code and organization, Steam stuff, and making sure I never had to touch linux (hissssss). Tom Sawyer for being ridiculously persistent with server hosting during the beta, being largely responsible for there being a beta server to use at all most of the time, and creating this awesome server hosting guide (and hosting our current live servers!). Vez for stepping up and giving Dystopia an aural overhaul and enhancing most of the weapon and implant sounds in the game. And of course the entire community for just being so damned dedicated and awesome and keeping this train rolling, and putting up with all of my blown release date estimates.

It's been a long time coming. My original estimate was a year ago, but a lot of things have happened since then, including needing to port Dystopia to a new engine branch for new Steamworks support. The port alone took months, and we couldn't really get any testing in until it was done, so a large amount of time was dedicated to making sure the balance was pretty good since just about every aspect of the game has been touched in some way in this update.

This isn't the end of Dystopia, in fact, one of the great things about finally getting this patch live is now we can update whenever we want. I'll continue to support the game and make sure it's balanced and fun, although don't expect another changelog this size anytime soon!

Speaking of changelogs. Are you prepared for this? Look at your scrollbar. Now back to me. You might just want to close the tab now, because I'm not so sure you're prepared for the monumental task of reading this changelog. Do you dare to try and conquer this massive mountain of change, this titanic text wall? Well, continue on brave player, for I present to you...

THE DYSTOPIA 1.4 CHANGELOG

Bug fixes:

Animation is no longer carried over when changing weapons, firing or reloading (so a player firing a weapon and then switching to the katana will no longer make it look like they swung the katana, or a reload animation hiding an attack etc.) One exception to this is katana swings, which continue to play through weapon change.

Looping spider grenade sound effect should be fixed

Better lag compensation between fast moving players

Cyber players will now always transmit their position to one another (so map optimization will not interfere with cyber trail visibility)

Players should no longer briefly appear floating somewhere in the map when they’re respawning

Infinite stealth bug fixed

Client command that would make stealth more visible removed

Floating HUD icons now fade in opacity when getting very close (so your screen won’t turn blue when being very close to a breakable objective etc.)

Fixed some stat tracking inconsistencies with implant energy use

Improved weapon attachments on player backs so there should be less clipping

Fixed some implant icon color inconsistencies (coldsuit, IFF info)

Switching to the rocket launcher while it’s reloading no longer causes it to spam the draw weapon animation

Decreased the comically large size of ejected shells from machpistol, smartlocks, assault rifle, mk808 and minigun

dys_ragdolls console command now actually works to hide bodies and gibs to improve FPS, and has been added to the multiplayer advanced options menu

Holstered weapons no longer float in the air for a short time after killing someone

Disabled primary weapons from being holstered as they were causing a huge FPS loss

meatspace.cfg now execs when you respawn (so if you’re dumpshock killed, you won’t be running around meatspace with cyberspace cfg executed)

Fixed rare end of map crash

Fixed bolts seeming to vanish in mid-air when landing a direct hit

Fixed cyberspace/meatspace microphone not working (being able to hear meatspace sounds while in cyberspace -- a super old feature that broke a while back)

Cyber microphone now has 384 range and volume scales as the source is further away from your meatspace body

Secondary can now be activated by just holding down +attack2 on cooldown

Ion Cannon:

Can now set zoom fov with dys_zoom_fov_ioncannon

Beam and impact particle is now team colored

Now renders a badass railgun style swirl effect. Can enable or disable it with dys_draw_ion_swirl

Rocket Launcher:

Rockets will now lock onto stealthers if the user has thermal active

Rockets that are not being guided by either laser or fly-by-wire now have their velocity doubled

Changed rocket cam FOV from 50 to 90, making it easier to aim FBW rockets

Rocket now locks on for 0.33 seconds (up from 0.25) upon touching someone with the laser (NOTE: Rockets still cannot lock onto stealthers)

If the rocket is locked on to someone, it's turn rate is quadrupled from 120 to 480 (FBW turn speed remains a constant 250)

If the rocket is locked on to someone, it no longer cares about line of sight for tracking (previously, if the rocket was behind someone, and the laser dot was on the front of them, the rocket would think the laser is behind a wall or something and not lock on!)

Like FBW, you can now blow up laser guided missiles by +attack, or stop laser guiding by +attack2

Rockets now “ignite” instantly (down from 0.3s)

Fixed rocket launcher being unable to fire for a short time upon a new missile being ready, and a few other bugs that could happen as a result of this

Fixed the last missile not guiding towards the laser dot if you’re out of ammo

Fixed holding secondary attack to dumbfire making you stop moving for a short time

Wired reflexes no longer affects minigun spin time (used to reduce it to 0.75s)

Basilisk:

Increased clip size to 15

Ammo changed to 30 starting, 60 max reserve

Increased total shot damage to 50 (center bullet now does 20)

Increased secondary fire velocity from 700 to 1000

Ammo screen implemented

Secondary fire now properly animates the weapon

Spider grenades:

Now respect player view when thrown, and are thrown with 512 velocity (makes it so you can choose where and how to throw spiders, i.e. up onto ledges)

Max damage now set instantly upon touching the ground rather than upon deployment (spiders start with much lower damage so when they blow up in the heavies face, it’s not as painful)

Health reduced to 15 (from 25)

Cyber:

All cyber damage is now counted 3x for stats to make it more on par with meatspace damage

Shaft now has particles at the end making it easier to judge distance

Cyber projectile explosion knockback tweaked for enemies: it now applies less base velocity from the explosion, but adds upwards velocity (relative to the victim’s gravity -- yes, you can now do perpendicular juggling)

Programs now no longer add a small random amount of energy usage each frame

Implants:

TAC Scan now has 10,000 range (up from 2,048)

Mediplant:

Range increased from 256 to 512

Self heal cost 7 -> 0

Self heal amount 7 -> 4

Other heal cost 10 -> 8

Other heal amount: 17 -> 16

Heavies now receive more per mediplant heal than the other classes (24). Energy cost remains the same as healing any other class

Punks now need to capture an item from the lower area to turn off a Corp frostwall blocking access to the objective screen (security is taken offline for 60 seconds on capture, the item takes 20 seconds to respawn when dropped)

Corps can now take a gravshaft up to objective 2 punk JIP, this is disabled when punks capture the item

Fixed Objective 2 laser random delay

Fixed punk spawn pads to be solid

Added a new JIP for Punks on Objective 3 with a new hackable: the giant glass screen can now be raised or lowered. Punks can also shoot at Corps who are closing data stores via this node through a big frostwall (ICE that can be shot through).

Broadcast:

Objective 1 sewer exit now leads to the objective room rather than the street, placing more emphasis on controlling cyberspace

Objective 1: Punks bring explosives from their spawn to 3 points on the map and trigger them via cyberspace

Objective 2: Punks capture a corp key card at their spawn enabling them to take objective in cyberspace. There’s hackable turrets, and a hackable/crackable conveyor belt hatch

Objective 3: Punks capture a certain amount of data from cyberspace, meatspacers capture a button that make getting data easier

Objective 4: Punks create viruses in their spawn via cyberspace and bring them to a location in meatspace, hackable turrets and hatch

Cybernetic:

Hostage cart bugs should be fixed

Detonate:

There’s a gate that can be cracked open or closed by the objective 1 JIP now

First objective door subobjective and logic fixed

Added lower exit for corp 1st spawn

Made punk 1st objective roof a little more open

Added a vent from 1st objective roof to 1st objective lobby area

Removed turrets on the dumpster/fence side of the Corp spawn on 1st, allowing punks to jump down and enter the lobby via this direction as well

Obj1 doors, Obj2's green door, and the "NO ENTRY" doors leading to Obj4 can all be cracked open temporarily

Removed outer turrets in last obj area so the area is safe for punks to be in

Obj4 turrets now disable on obj3 and stay disabled

Removed kill trigger that activates at the final objective on obj2 recap. Now there is no defense for final once obj3 is taken regardless of recap, and Corps can freely attack it without necessarily having to recap 2nd if they took 3rd.

Objective 3 corp JIP is now disabled at all times unless punks own objective 2

Silo doors now open on objective 2 capture (and close during the countdown)

Added new objective 3 hackable route that goes past objective 2 JIP and leads to a vent that you can drop down from, landing at the hallway opposite final corp spawn

Objective 2 spawn redesigned and a second exit added

Objective 2 vent hackable is now in the yellow node (contestable) and now controls whether or not the electricity is on. You can jump through the fence gap even if the electricity is on as long as you don't touch any metal parts.

Vent system heavily simplified, now the only vent is from storage room to control room (last corp JIP), and the vents have been raised so you can run/jump through them

Flush vents now clear the entire vent system with a fan kill trigger

Restricted corp access in cyber on obj1/obj2 so they can’t go open obj3 doors

Playerclips, optimization, detail pass, lighting pass, etc.

Undermine:

Objective 2 can now captured by cracking the screen in meatspace (even if it's disabled). It takes 20 seconds.

The doors leading to objective 2 that can be hacked open or closed can be cracked open temporarily

Raised the delay before Obj3 ports re-open after a corp decker leaves an EU node to 15 seconds (so there is a minimum 15 second delay between a corp exiting an EU and re-entering)

Added a bunch of cyber crystals in obj3 cyberspace on the floating cubes

Moved turrets in final corp spawn to allow easier access to corp deckers by punks

Obj1 gas should no longer be really dark/hard to see sometimes

Vaccine:

Removed foyer door buttons on objective 1, you can now open these doors normally

Added turret to Corp 1st spawn to prevent potential spawn camping

Dock and back door are now separate nodes/screens in cyberspace (back door is in the node previously used for foyer door control)

Airlock room now has a wall blocking line of sight from the two corp exits

Added trigger_crackable, a trigger that lets players “crack” objects with their cyberdeck. While inside, the trigger updates the players HUD as to how he can interact with it. While cracking, a progress bar will show how long until the crack is complete.

Added cyber_gravity_volume, which replaces the old point entity and is much more consistent and easier to use

dys_item and trigger_item are now fully functional and can be used in a variety of ways

Added cyber_gravity_align, a trigger volume which sets a players gravity alignment to a specified angle (allows for much more control than cyber_floor, useful for areas where players need to be a certain angle)

Added cyber_crystal, a “medpack for cyberspace”. By default restores 5 energy and respawns in 30 seconds, although these values can be changed

Added func_brush_colorblend, which acts like a func_brush but can blend from one color to another over a period of time

Dozens of past contributors, many who joined from the community itself, to make all of this possible!

Check out the original trailer and see how many differences you can spot:

It's been an awesome ride and I'm still having a blast, and I'm glad so many others have stuck around for so long to watch and help Dystopia and PHG grow. I've never seen a community full of such talent and passion, always coming to the aid of this humble mod whenever it has needed it, always creating more awesome content and keeping the game going where dozens of others have faded away.

Thanks for all the great times, and all the ones to come.

I was originally hoping to have 1.4 done for today, but a news post will have to suffice! The update is back on track after a couple weeks of SDK hiccups. Atomy has been crushing bugs and we're getting really close to a clean build.

Hey everyone! Just wanted to give a quick update as to how the Dystopia patch is coming along. I've talked to a bunch of players about this over the past weeks, but I realized I haven't posted anything about it here and wanted to fix that.

The update is coming along great. For a while (the first half of this year, really) we were sort of drifting along wondering if this thing would ever be released. We were stuck between a rock and a hard place: waiting on Valve to release a (then only rumored about) SDK update, or just doing all of the hard work ourselves to get the game releasable. The traditional way of releasing was asking Valve to do it for us and sending them a zip of the game, and this was kind of unworkable for a lot of reasons (plus, Valve probably would've just told us to wait anyway). The new method involves SteamPipe, Valve's new distribution system which gives the developer total control over their game and updates to it. This also means that once we're on this new system, we can update more frequently as well. Fortunately, the SDK update cometh! Unfortunately, it brought a lot of extra work with it, all of it required if we want to be on SteamPipe.

The SDK update requires an engine port, along the same lines as what we did in the past, first for the Episode 1 engine update and later for the Orange Box version. This means we start with a fresh SDK, compare it with the SDK code we were using previously (as modifications to Valve code are a necessary evil sometimes), make notes about what will probably be broken - I wrote about 7 pages of notes just myself - and merge the changes. After that's done, copy over the Dystopia code and see what happens. Of course, there will be tons of compiler errors which have to be fixed before the game will even run.

After the game finally runs again, there will be a ton of obvious broken stuff that needs to be fixed. That's the stage we're at right now. First the game ran, but maps didn't load. Now maps load, but you can't spawn. And so it goes.

The good news is, after we do a rough testing pass and get the game into a form that looks and smells like Dystopia again, we should be able to start proper testing right away and get it on the fast track to release.

Also, I wanted to personally thank everyone in the community who has been spreading the word and increasing the Dystopia player count again, and everyone who runs the daily pick-up games. It's awesome that we have so many people dedicated to this game who are keeping the community alive and well, and it's inspiring. Thanks everyone!

I wanted to give everyone an update as to what is going on with the future of Dystopia. Obviously everyone at PHG has been hard at work on Blade Symphony and this has unfortunately resulted in Dystopia being put to the side for the most part for the past two years. This is no longer the case and as of last month I have returned to working full time on Dystopia along with some new people from the community hopping on board. My current gameplan is to get an update out by the end of the year and I'm working hard to make this a reality.

Dystopia 1.4

A few of us have been working on and off on a new Dystopia patch for the past year or so alongside BSym development. The original plan was to release a small patch, 1.31, that addresses some of the main complaints with the game. Instead, we're going to be rolling the existing changes out into one big patch along with lots more stuff.

What to Expect in 1.4:

A new map with a focus on a new gameplay element

Existing map fixes and balancing, with some boring objectives being reworked entirely

Weapon balancing

Bug fixes

Visual and audio passes on some of the more outdated assets in the game

A bigger emphasis on accessibility for new players

Lots of features that should have been in years ago!

Progress

As for how all this is progressing, the new map (which constitutes the bulk of the work) is currently fully blocked out, logic'd up and ready to be detailed. It just needs time for any balance issues to become apparent when we start testing. I still have to work on the existing maps, but these range from no changes being necessary for some maps to pretty big overhauls for others. The maps that I suspect will need the most work are probably Assemble, Injection, Exodus and Undermine. Broadcast and Cybernetic will probably get moderate changes. Fortress, Detonate, Vaccine, and Silo will only need minor tweaks if anything (for example, removal of physics props; or slight geometry changes - looking at you, airlock).

There's a lot of other features I'd like to get in as well, especially ones related to making the game more approachable for new players, but we'll see how much time we have for these as we get closer to release as some of these are big projects (for example, overhauling the "helper" system to make it actually helpful).

Here are a few concepts I've made and have been working towards implementing for helping newbies:

As mentioned above, there is a new map coming as well. Currently it's named "Coast". The map takes place on a shoreline where a corporate facility uses a security company as a front to hide some shady dealings with blackmarket implants. The punks arrive in what the corps assume is a routine shipment via submarine and proceed to assault the facility and take this corp out of the blackmarket scene.

The new gameplay featured here is all about items. Items have been in Dystopia for a long time but have never worked properly. We finally got them working correctly and they add quite a lot of variety to what can be done with objectives! It can really morph some of what usually boils down to "press this button to win" into a much more physical feeling. Such is the case when stealing data in this map, instead of pressing a button, you actually pick up data chunks and bring them back to your node. When the punks have to blow up security terminals to gain access to the facility, they don't just shoot at them until they explode - rather, they have to take explosives from their base and plant them in key positions which the corps can then attempt to disarm. It should be a lot of fun and I can't wait to see how it plays in testing!

Testing

With all of the new changes that will require a lot of balancing and general QA, we're going to be opening testing up once again. I'm hoping to have it be open to the public but we're still working out the logistics on it. Testing should start pretty soon, so keep your eyes open! In the meantime, get the NS2 out of your system, because 1.4 is going to be big! :D